The invention concerns a cranking arrangement with an output shaft driven by a rotor and carrying a pinion for driving a toothed ring of an internal combustion engine, the output shaft being supported so that it can be displaced axially for the engagement and disengagement of the pinion.
In motor vehicle technology, such cranking arrangements are used for starting the vehicle internal combustion engines. For the starting procedure of the vehicle internal combustion engines, a driven pinion must engage in a toothed ring of the internal combustion engine. An output shaft carrying the pinion is supported so that it can be displaced axially in order to provide the axial movement necessary for this purpose. When the starting procedure has been ended, the pinion disengages from the toothed ring, the output shaft returning to its initial position (disengaged position). After disengagement, it is disadvantageous for the pinion to continue to rotate for a relatively long time because then, in the event of a possible restart procedure, the engagement is not clean and damage may result due to a large relative motion between the pinion and the toothed ring. The run-down time is particularly long in the case of geared cranking arrangements--compared with direct cranking arrangements (without gear stage) - because the moments of inertia increase with the square of the transmission ratio.